Blogs from Missouri, United States, North America - page 4

THE LION OF MISSOURI As part of the Missouri Compromise in 1820 the State of Missouri was admitted to the union as a slave holding state. Slavery was part of their statehood charter. When the Civil War fetched loose in 1861 Missouri did not have to secede from the union in order to keep its slaves. In the same election that Uncle Abe Lincoln ascended to the Presidency a perfidious bastard named Claiborne Jackson was elected Governor of Missouri. Jackson was staunchly pro-Confederate and insisted on another election in which Missouri would secede. Much to his chagrin the voters elected to remain neutral. There were, however, federal forces already in Missouri that Jackson viewed as a violation of the state’s neutrality. He then applied to Jefferson Davis to have his state annexed to the Confederacy and ... read more

Where do I start? It's been a tough year... we lost our beloved Scaredy cat in March.... then Keith passed suddenly which threw us for a loop….and then the sweetest dog on Earth, my Simon, passed away just last month. September was the saddest month of my life thus far. I can still barely talk about losing Simon. I miss him almost every day. It's like a suffocating lump in your throat that doesn't go away. In other news, the St Louis Cardinals had a great year. I've always loved baseball and at some point in my life I switched from backing the KC Royals to the STL Cardinals. This year, with Simon being sick and blind, he couldn't do much.. he would whine if I didn't stay near him....so I would sit with him after ... read more

Day 3 Woke up bright and early on Spring Creeks Farm in Willow Springs, MO! Heather went for an early morning walk/jog around the property and I stayed behind to blog and get caffeinated. On her walk, Heather met some of the local cattle and also found a small box turtle who seemed as though he was heading for the creek behind George and Martha’s home, so she helped him get there quicker (after bringing him to the house to show us of course)! Once everyone was awake, Martha made a delicious breakfast of pancakes, scrambled eggs and sausage (with Chef Diego’s help). It’s so nice sitting around the kitchen table spending time with family, really brings home the entire reason for this trip which is to see and spend time with all the lovely people ... read more

July 2 When we got up this morning I was worrying about changing the trailer tire. I realized in the middle of the night that we could just call road side assistance. Our issuance has it on the policy, technically were not along the road but I didn’t think just cause were parked that would matter, we are traveling. So I mentioned it to David, who did seem a little reluctant to get started on the task of changing the tire. I called USAA roadside assistance they had me go to a web site to fill out the form and within just a few minutes said they would text me who was coming. Part of the difficulty was we needed to leave for our visitor tour at Warm Springs Ranch at noon so we didn’t have ... read more

July 1 David got up early this morning hoping it wouldn’t be as hot. It was cooler but in the bright sun it was still miserable to be out long. He got everything undone while I put things away and closed up the trailer, walked the dogs and got ready to hitch up the trailer. As they say in New Jersey, bada bing, bada boom we were hooked up and on the road to Columbia MO, about 300 miles. We were on I-70 the whole way except for last 8 miles in Colombia turning North to our campground. Just as we were leaving on David’s last walk around the trailer he notice some scallop like indentations on the trailer tire, passenger side front. He was quite concerned but said we’d monitor it today and he’d change ... read more